"Fitting" health and fitness into your life - The Simple Comprehensive Plan

Someone I know (who will remain anonymous, but you may know who you are! ;-)) gave me one of the most often repeated excuses for exercising today, 'how do you fit 30 minutes a day into your schedule', so I decided that rather than put up my simple tips piece by piece I would create a post about the comprehensive plan that I follow. There are two main parts of the plan, exercise and nutrition, and there are ways to simplify both.

Disclaimer: Yes everyone's life and goals are different and we all have different responsibilities so I am not saying this is the only way, just a simple plan you might be able to start with. 

Part I - Nutrition 

Let's start with the nutrition. As the old saying goes, you can't out-exercise a bad diet, so you have to start by putting the right nutrients in your body. Now there are lots of different specific plans out there tailored to different specific goals, and you will get lots of debate about many different parts of the plans like gluten, fats, and carbs, but I want to keep this simple. Obviously if you have allergies avoid any items you have reactions to.


Start with the simple plan known as ERF, Eat Real Food. This means avoid processed and packaged food as much as possible. If you can't hunt it or pick it then don't eat it. This means basically just eating plants and animals! Stick to vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts, and lean protein. There is plenty of variety to choose from here. You can have leafy greens, sprouts, tubers, roots, tomatoes, onions, broccoli, cauliflower, beets, carrots, squash and much more. In the animal department limit your red meat and stick to lean protein like chicken, turkey and pork along with fish regularly. Dairy is ok but as adults you can use low or non-fat products from the dairy aisle. Now I know that bread and some other carbs are prepared but if you stick to "100% whole grain" products (that is how the label should read) then you are doing ok. Whole grain still contains the carbs but it also contains fiber which slows the digestion and keeps your blood glucose from spiking. If you can afford it you should try to buy organic whenever possible. If not you can find the list for the "Dirty Dozen" items that are really bad when grown conventionally and not organic and just buy those organic.

Once you are set on which real foods you want to eat the next step is to plan your meals. This is one of the most crucial aspects of the plan. People without a plan are more likely to eat poorly so schedule your meals. There are many ways to do this, plenty of planning websites and apps out there,and a lot of great healthy eating cookbooks too. Or you can use the old fashioned way my wife and I do, use a whiteboard calendar in the kitchen. We pick our meals on Sunday, shop for all the foods, and then her and I split the weeknights up and write in our chosen meals that we are cooking. In this way we know what foods to defrost the night before and who has to do what after we pick up our son each day.

The next step in the nutrition plan is to prep as much of your meals ahead of time as possible. For our lunches we eat salads and fruit all week so we prep all of it in Tupperware and store it in our basement fridge all week so each night we can just grab our next day's items and put them in the kitchen fridge to take the next day. We also do this for our son's lunches for daycare. I prep as much of my breakfast as I can the night before, which in my case involves putting some egg whites with one yolk in a container and getting my Shakeology bottle ready with whatever liquids I need so I can throw in the powder and blend it when I get up. Generally it takes us about an hour to an hour and a half each Sunday to prep, but then we don't have to worry all week!

Finally what to do when you eat out? Stick to the same rules. Avoid heavy creamy sauces, beware of restaurant salads with lots of toppings, avoid fried foods, etc. Look for the lean, natural items on the menu and ask for sauces on the side or other modifications. Most restaurants will oblige.

If you stick to this plan and use the 85/15 rule you will do great. Shoot for the whole foods 85% of the time and if you aren't perfect you will do just fine.

Part II - Exercise

There's lots of exercise slogans out there but in the end I think Nike said it best, Just Do It. Don't think about it, worry about it, or stress. Just Do It. By the time you worry about it you could have been done! Action before motivation. 

Doctor's recommend 30 minutes of exercise at least 5 days a week. Guess what? 30 minutes is 2.08333% of your day. Doesn't sound that bad when I put it like that right? I mean you could get 2% of almost any test right even if you never studied! 

So why do people freak out about spending 2% of their day to make sure they keep getting to have days? We have hectic schedules with work, kids, bills, and all the other things that add up. So how do you get all that other stuff in? You plan to do it. It's on your calendar (ok maybe not all of it but you get the point) everyday to go to work, to pick up the kids at school, to take them to the soccer game, to go to the dentist. You write all those things down. So here's how you do it with exercise; don't "find" time, make time!

That's right, make the time. Put it in your calendar. Write it down. Put that calendar somewhere where you will see it every day. Put alarms in your iPhone. It may not always be the ideal time, but do it anyway. Get up 30 minutes earlier or go to bed 30 minutes later (though I def recommend earlier as opposed to later). Is it gonna kill you if you don't see Fallon tonight? We all know his new musical gold will be on Facebook tomorrow anyway! Talk it over with your spouse, significant other, or family. Communicate when changes need to be made. Work together to make sure you can do it. 

Many programs come with calendars to follow but if you are doing your own stuff that's fine. Just make a calendar like this and write down your plans.

When it comes to your workouts you also have to have a plan. Just winging it won't work either and you need to constantly challenge and change your routines so you don't plateau. Every 4-6 weeks your routines or exercises should change. This will keep you from falling into a lull. The beauty of the Team Beachbody programs is that they take the guesswork out of this part for you!

Summary

So there it is everyone, a simple and easy to follow plan to get you started on the road to health and fitness. The final part is up to you. There is another saying I want to leave you with. It goes something like this; whether you believe you can or can't do something you are right. 

Of course my desire is to help you in your journey. I believe I can help you, and I believe you CAN do it. So join me here. Join one of my challenge groups. I promise you will love what you become!